We had decided that after yesterday we were just going to take it easy today and have a chilling day. We both woke up fairly early mostly cos of the happy birds outside. After I managed to disentangle myself from the mosquito net I discovered that we had a not so little visitor make himself at home during the night. Thankfully I think he was almost dead cos when Mike flicked him out the door he didn't make much of an attempt to run off.



We got the morning started, Mike much faster than me, and he headed off for coffee while I took a lovely hot shower (keeping an eye out for any peeping geckos of course). I went to meet Mike for breakfast on the balcony of the hotel; this is not the most interesting meal here in South America, today we had bread and jam with juice and coffee, the other choice is eggs, which are usually scrambled.
After breakfast we went for a walk along the beach and headed towards the fish unloading area again. The beach has loads of crabs scurrying just out off reach of where we were putting our feet down, they are all different sizes but almost the same colour as the sand. They disappear down perfectly round holes when you get too near - can you see him?
When we got to the smelly fish unloading area it was pretty much the same sight as yesterday evening but there were more boats, more people and more birds. Also this morning the kitchen was open. The ladies were present today and they were cleaning the fish on the beach and then other ladies were cooking them up under huge tarps in big saucepans. We didn't hang around too long so we headed to the town main street and the mercado. This is definitely not on the scale of the one in Cuenca but they still had the veggies and of course the meat, and here they had lots of things that come out of the ocean. After wandering the streets for a little while we almost caught a moto back to the hotel but the driver wanted $0.50 EACH and he wouldn't change his mind so we ended up walking back along the beach which was much nicer than riding anyway. It's not really about the $0.50, it is after all just $0.50, but there's a principle - or so I'm told!








We sat and had a cold one when we got back and we had a little company. Then we grabbed some hammocks and headed off to the beach to do a little reading and relaxing. The hotel had things on the beach for guests to hang the hammocks off; Mike hung them and into them we got. I had figured that we could spend the day just hanging and reading but after about 5 minutes I was ready to leave - the stupid hammock made me seasick or hammock sick as the case may be. Mike didn't have the same problem, he managed to get a little shut eye, and as long as I didn't move and the hammock didn't sway I was okay, but I have to let you in on a secret, the smile in the photo below is fake. The view from the hammock was gorgeous and we did spend a while on the beach before heading back for lunch. We spent the rest of the afternoon at the hotel just enjoying the fresh ocean air from the comfort of a nice sturdy chair.









We had a nice dinner and desert tonight and finally managed to see the gecko that lives in the roof above the dining area. He has been making a heck of a noise since we've been here and he finally poked his head out tonight, I think to say goodbye.

Mike: I think the gecko was saying "I'll be glad to see the back side of you". You sure moan a lot! Who gets sea sick in a hammock?